Rev Donald Sage
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Donald Sage was the new minister in Strathnaver during the second wave of burnings and the first news of the impending evictions was brought by a man running to his manse at Achness in October 1818. The warning was correct. He, himself, was evicted from the manse along with 2000 or so others in the strath. He preached his last sermon in the open air the Sunday before the evictions began but, by the time the burning squad reached Strathnaver, he was gone. He passed through Strathnaver the following week,
'Of all the houses the thatched roofs were gone, but the walls, built of alternate layers of turf and stone remained. The flames of the preceding week still slumbered in their ruins and sent up into the air spiral columns of smoke; whilst here a gable and there a long side-wall might be seen tumbling to the ground from which a cloud of smoke, and then a dusty flame, slowly sprang up'.
Apparently this was not the only time he deserted his parishioners. It is said he agreed to go with his flock to the settlement at Red River, Manitoba, though he never did and no mention is made of this in his book.
His memoirs of the Clearances were edited by his son and published posthumously 70 years later as Memorabilia Domestica (so it is a little harsh of Eric Richards to cavil that some of his dates were wrong). From the grave his descriptions damn the landlords but at the time, although he did not actively collude in the evictions, as had many of his colleagues in the Church of Scotland, he had little to say and ran away when his congregation needed him.
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